The Nepean art studio where adults with developmental disabilities choose their day is fighting to stay afloat

Silver Spring Studio, the art and cooking studio for adults with developmental disabilities on the old Silver Spring Farm property, is struggling to secure its future, as reported by the Ottawa Citizen this week. The studio, part of the Ottawa-Carleton Association for Persons with Developmental Disabilities, runs two three-hour classes every weekday, painting, cooking and hundreds of other disciplines, for people 16 and older.

Rosemarie Ferguson, who runs the studio, told the Citizen it operates without grants or dedicated funding, on the work of herself, two employees and volunteers. She is paid for 35 hours a week and works closer to 60. Because the studio cannot offer direct billing, classes can cost families hundreds of dollars up front, a real barrier for participants whose support comes through the Ontario Disability Support Program.

What makes the place matter is choice. Customers choose to spend their time there, Ferguson told the Citizen, which is special for people who may not get a lot of choice elsewhere in their lives. One regular, celebrating her 64th birthday at the studio, put it simply: she likes to get out of the apartment, and she keeps every painting she makes.

The community has already stepped in once. Students from St. Paul High School's Elite Skilled Trades Academy, working with the carpenters' union Local 93, built the studio's accessible garden this school year: raised planters reachable from a wheelchair, and picnic tables with wheelchair spaces in the middle rather than bolted on at the ends. The garden is year two of a five-year accessibility plan, and its onions are already part of the programming.

For Barrhaven and South Nepean families supporting an adult with a developmental disability, the studio is one of the few programs of its kind in the west end. The Bugle has reached out to the studio.